Monday, 20 June 2022

Today we will be operating on Þruma RIB for our 10:00, 12:00, 14:00 and 20:00 Premium Whale tours and on our lovely vessel Eldey and Elding for the 09:00, 10:00, 13:00, 14:00, 17:00 and 20:30 Classic Whale Watching tours. Make sure to dress appropriately for the tours as it is always colder on sea than on land. If you are prone to seasickness, please consult with our team prior to boarding.

• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 09:00
• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 10:00
• PREMIUM WHALE TOUR | 10:00
• PREMIUM WHALE TOUR | 12:00
• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 13:00
• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 14:00
• PREMIUM WHALE TOUR | 14:00
• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 17:00
• PREMIUM WHALE TOUR | 20:00
• CLASSIC WHALE TOUR | 20:30

Report from Eldey: nice day at sea today, cloudy but not too cold or windy. However, the swell was quite high (~1.3 metres), which made the sail challenging for a lot of people. A good day for going at sea but also a good day for sea sickness tablets! The morning was plentiful of whales, with two humpback whales spotted close to Grótta lighthouse and three more spotted further away from Reykjavik, and two minke whales that made a brief appearance during our tour. Nevertheless, all the whales we encountered appeared to be elusive, showing their selves for brief moments to then go for deep dives, often showing their fluke. It looked like they didn't wanna have anything to do with us, and were very interested in feeding or resting, instead. At some point though we had the beautiful up-close sight of a humpback slapping its tail on the water surface, probably to communicate with all the whales in the area, since they were so abundant in that day.

-Francesco Golin

Report from Elding: Despite some westerly winds and swell, this morning's sightings made any risk of feeling a bit seasick 100% worth it. The tour started with two separate humpback whales that were often fluke diving in line with Grótta, close to Reykjavík city. We then decided to go a bit further out where we encountered two shy minke whales and a humpback whale, but as they only surfaced once we continued our journey. Next we spotted a large flock of birds with underneath them a humpback whale feeding and at least six (!) minke whales feeding in the area. The minke whales really stole the show as they were frequently surfacing and present all around the boat, this was a sighting even the crew had never xperienced before. Thinking we had seen it all, we headed in the direction of Reykjavík to stop at Engey to see some puffins, but turns out the best was yet to come .. in the distance we spotted 7-9 white-beaked dolphins leaping high out of the water, among them the blow of a humpback whale. The dolphins were bothering the whale a bit, but after some time a second humpback arrived to the scene. We had just moments before seen this individual breach a bit further on, and his arrival seemed to scare away the dolphins. With the dolphins gone, the humpbacks' full attention was now on us: they encircled our boat, sometimes coming up on our port side, starboard, front or back of the boat, but always just within a few meters from Elding. The sighting was really a once-in-a-lifetime moment where we shared half an hour with these incredible ge, and beautiful animals. To finish strong, one of the humpback whales breached with its full body out of the water. An unforgettable tour!

- Eline van Aalderink 

Report from Eldey: This afternoon it was clear and sunny and beautiful landscapes were with us the whole tour. In the horizon a flock of birds was spotted and we went to check that area out. We were lucky to see many northern gannets in the bay today. In that area at least 5 minke whales appeared. Some of them elusive or careless about our boat, and some of them surfacing less than 20 meters away from our boat! Suddenly, out of nowhere a humpback whale breached 2 times in a row! It was incredible. Unfortunately, the whale was very far a away so when we got closer it disapeared so we couldn't have a better look to this gentle giant. Later on we sighted 2 humpback whales swimming together, they were swimming pretty relaxed, showing us a milling behaviour. While enjoying the presence of this magnificent animals another humpback whale surfaced in between a flock of seabirds. As the pair were very relaxed and nice we decided to stay for quite some time. Happy with our sightings and unfortunately running out of time we turned back to the harbour.

- Estel Sanchez

Report from Elding: We were only minutes out of the harbour when we found our first whale, I had only just finished the safety demonstration. A passenger spotted a minke whale on our left hand side and shortly after another minke appeared on our left again. They were rather shy and travelling underwater so we decided to leave them as we had spotted 3 blows on the horizon near to one of Elding's other whale watching boats, Eldey. Nearing these blows suddenly a humpback whale appeared alongside the boat, coming up to breathe again before diving below the waves. We began to turn the boat around but this individual spent a long time underwater so we left for one of the other 3 humpback whales in the area, and waited for it to surface after diving again. The whales today were spending unusually long underwater but this particular individual did finally come back up, right next to a Whale Safari RIB, before taking a few short breathes and diving again. Due to the length of these particular whale's dives we decided to try and find another whale that wanted to spend more time with us, so we left these animals again and searched for more. We found plenty of minke whales, and another humpback on the horizon, but sadly time did not permit to go and spend some time with it, so we began heading home. However in total we managed to find 4 humpback whales and about 8 minke whales, the most I have ever seen on a single trip, with previous trips finding at most 2.

- Liam van Walsum

The views of Faxaflói bay this afternoon were wonderful and sailing out was pleasant as the wind wasn't too strong and there was only a tiny bit of swell. It didn't take us too long to find cetaceans today, as not one but four minke whales were spotted only a few meters in front of us. Some of them were as usually travelling at a rather fast pace. Eventually some came up only 5 meters away at times and it was lovely and curious to see them swimming quite slowly. On this tour we also found 2 humpback whales swimming together. We followed them for a while as they were swimming erratically but surfacing very slowly and in a very casual manner. After watching these wonderful animals for sometime it was decided to continue the tour not before crossing our paths with another humpback whale. What a wonderful afternoon to be out on the water!

-Francesco Golin

Report from Elding : We started to head off in the midnight sun to hopefully see again some humpback whales that were seen today. After 40 min of sailing, we found our first blows of humpback whales. Our first humpback whale encountered was together with a minke whale that surfaced a few times before it disappeared again. That humpback whale was quite friendly, showed us its beautiful fluke a few times and circled one time the boat, which got us some close looks. We then ventured off and soon found another humpback whale. After some time with that one, we decided to continue our trip in the direction of the harbour. We then saw an extra 2 blows of humpback whales together, surrounded by arctic terns, probably feeding. We stayed only a few minutes as the whales started changing a lot directions. We then decided it was time to come back to the harbour, and by the entrance we had our biggest surprise : a family pod of orcas a few meters away from the entrance of the harbour, we could not believe our eyes, the passengers and the crew was in absolute chock to see those beautiful creatures by Reykjavik. We spent some minutes with that pod of about 6 orcas : 1 big male, 2 females, 1 small male, one juvenile and a baby, peacefully surfacing right next to us in that midnight sun. It was still really much excited and chocked by that unexpected sighting that we then came back to reykjavik. By far my best trip ever, it will take time to get over that beautiful sighting.

- Melanie Magnan

Common guillemot, Atlantic puffin, arctic tern, herring gull, black-backed gull, icelandic gull, glaucus gull, black-legged kittiwake, eider duck, northern fulmar, northern gannet, arctic skua.